There are so many posts on fiberglass repairs and bottom jobs that I am sure I am missing something. My apologies in advance. But after three hours of searching this forum and youtube I haven't found what I'm looking for, so . . .

My 1984 H16 hulls are taking on water from being ground down on the beach. There aren't big structural holes, it has just created tiny little breaches you can get a pin through at this point. They've never been repaired, so I intend to use polyester to repair them. I am looking for videos showing as much step-by-step detail as possible.

For logistical reasons I have to do this on the beach, after turning the H16 upside down. I know, I know, not optimal. The esthetics are unimportant, BTW.

From what I've picked up so far, first I'm going to sand off the gelcoat on the surrounding areas, and rough up the underlying fiberglass. I'm going to lay down 2" fiberglass tape, then 4", then 6". Each time, I'm going to use a roller to put polyester resin over the fiberglass, then roll over that with a metal roller to get air out of it, and wait until it cures before adding the next layer. When I'm done with the three layers, I will wait for full setting time, then sand it down. Then I will roller gelcoat over the repair.

4" and 6" wide tape sounds pretty wide. I would probably think tapes between 1" and 3" wide would be more appropriate.

Doing the work on the beach, your biggest challenge is going to be keeping it clean. This is not an aestetical issue, its a bonding issue. Dirt in the repair will decrease the adhesion between the hull and the repair tape. Clean the hull thoroughly with acetone, keep sand and dirt out of the glass tape and resin, don't attempt this repair on a windy day.

You can sail no problem without gelcoat on the hull- there's no gelcoat there now. I would let it cure for a full day before using however.

1. So with the thinner tape, do I fold that over the "tips" of the keels, or do I run one length of tape on each side of the tips of the keels?2. Do I run the tape the whole length of the keels, or just the parts which drag across the sand?3. Are you saying I should let the polyester/fiberglass cure for a full day before sailing? Or that I should let the gelcoat cure for a full day after I put that on?

Here's a link to an extensive blog which chronicles John Ward's recent bottom job and complete hull restoration on his Hobie 16: http://hobie16bottomjob.blogspot.com/. Extremely well done - the restoration and the blog.

Here's a link to an extensive blog which chronicles John Ward's recent bottom job and complete hull restoration on his Hobie 16: http://hobie16bottomjob.blogspot.com/. Extremely well done - the restoration and the blog.

Excellent instructions, thank you for sharing. I noticed this guy's lay-up order is the opposite of what Paris described in the original post: apply the 2" tape first, then the 1 1/2" then the 1". I'm going to be doing this myself in the spring. Question: My understanding is gelcoat is simply colored resin, correct? If yes, why does everybody seem to use the clear resin?

I noticed this guy's lay-up order is the opposite of what Paris described in the original post: apply the 2" tape first, then the 1 1/2" then the 1". I'm going to be doing this myself in the spring.

The advantage of putting successively wider pieces of tape over one another is that when you go to fair in the edges of the tape, you only have to sand one edge. If you stack the glass up like a pyramid, (successively narrower pieces on top of one another), then you have to fair in the edge of each piece of tape, so more sanding.

Quote:

Question: My understanding is gelcoat is simply colored resin, correct? If yes, why does everybody seem to use the clear resin?

Clear resin allows you to see when the glass is fully wet out (the glass goes from translucent to clear when it is fully saturated). I think this would be more difficult to see with a colored resin.

I am going to do this repair soon as well. I ordered 3 inch tape. Is this way overkill. I see the previous article recommends 1 inch tape. Can I simply cut the tape to 1 inch if needed? I know it may create some fraying that will create more work for later. Is three inches wide just too much?

The whole point of using tape is that the edges are stitched so there is no unraveling. Figure you need to sand back the gelcoat wherever you are going to laminate the glass, so you are going to be sanding back a lot of gelcoat with the 3" tape. Tape is cheap. I would save some headach and just get the right width.